


The Woodrow Harper Suite

by sipjackerryjuice



Category: Tales from the Gas Station
Genre: Bedside Manor, Fluff, Happy Ending, Jackerry, M/M, SPOILERS!!!!, also nudity, but theres implied smut, but ya know, jackxjerry, jerk, no actual smut, one bed, one bed trope, platonic nudity ig, spoilers for volume three and Bedside Manor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:35:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27004432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sipjackerryjuice/pseuds/sipjackerryjuice
Summary: The Woodrow Harper Suite has only one bed, I'm afraid.
Relationships: Jack/Jerry (Tales From the Gas Station)
Kudos: 24





	1. Wrong Place, Wrong Time

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone!  
> I decided to write the one bed scene we were robbed of in Bedside Manor  
> thank you to all my lovely friends (Anne, Mesa, Jess, Aut, etc.) in Pain Gravy, I don't know what I'd do without you  
> I certainly wouldn't have been able to write all this without your help and encouragement  
> as always leave a comment/kudos if you liked it  
> here you go, enjoy!!

Jerry tried the handle of the door. Nothing.  
"Looks like we're stuck here in here." He said nonchalantly.  
I was busy desperately trying the windows. The latch felt like it was glued down.  
"Jerry, do you understand how bad this situation is? We're trapped."  
Jerry shrugged.  
"Okay. Let me try something. Move out of the way."  
I turned towards him.  
"Huh?"  
He just barely missed me as he ran full speed at the window.  
"JERRY WHAT THE FUCK!!"  
Instead of going crashing through the glass and plummeting to the hard ground, he just bounced off and fell to the floor.  
"Plexiglass," I muttered as I knocked on the window, "it's bulletproof."  
"Oh, that's… that's not good. That's not good at all."  
I put my hands on the side of my head and tried to slow my breathing. We're gonna die here.  
Jerry quickly got up and came to my side, putting both hands on my shoulders.  
"Listen. I think our best course of action right now is to try and get at least a little rest, and then we can find a way out of this janky ass place. Just calm your tits, dude."  
Jerry and I turned and looked at the one bed. It was big enough for maybe three or four people. But for some reason, it looked about as small as a twin bed to me. After several minutes of reassurances from Jerry, I finally got my breathing under control.  
"Listen, why don't you go take a shower? It'll calm you down, I think."  
I nodded and grabbed a clean t-shirt and underwear from my bag. I had enough water left in my bottle to take my meds after I showered.  
I went into the bathroom and stripped, leaving the door slightly ajar. I didn't trust this place not to lock me inside and have the walls close in on me. When I got what little sleep I could with my sleeping pills, I often had nightmares of dying like that.  
Maybe spikes would come out of the walls. Perhaps they'd drown me. My mind ran through a million different and horrible ways to die in this place.  
After taking a minute to figure out how to work it, I turned on the water and stepped into the spacious shower. I yelped when the scalding water hit my back and quickly turned it down. As the water cooled down to a comfortable temperature, I washed off with the soap in the soap dish. It could be poisoned, but I was sweaty and dirty enough not to care. I hadn't showered since we left.  
The steam fogged up the glass door until I couldn't see the bathroom anymore. I saw something skitter across the floor in the corner of my eye, and the hiss of the water sounded reminiscent of the soft _krikrikri_ I'd heard ever since entering this stupid manor.  
When I saw the yellow eyes glowing outside the shower, I shut my eyes tightly.  
I washed my hair and then, once it was rinsed, turned off the water. After waiting until the shower door defogged, I stepped out and dried off. I waited for something to pounce from nowhere and suck my brains from my ears, but that didn't happen.  
After putting on my boxers and t-shirt, I walked into the bedroom. Jerry was standing with his back to me, stretching his arms up and letting out a loud, audible yawn. And he was completely naked.  
"Dude!"  
He turned around, too fast for me to avert my eyes in time, giving me a full, unobstructed view of his crotch.  
"Why are you naked?!"  
"Ohhhh shit, sorry man. I figured I'd go ahead and strip so I can shower."  
I suddenly realized that I was still looking. _God, it probably looked like I was staring._ I quickly looked away.  
"Wait… Jerry… you already showered. Earlier. When we got here before we changed."  
He shook his head like he was trying to free a leaf from his hair and gave me a confused smile.  
"No, I didn't. I'm sweaty and gross, and I'd definitely remember taking a shower."  
_Why were my eyes drifting back down?_  
I looked away again. I needed to get this interaction over with and get naked Jerry away from me. It was making me feel funny in a way I hadn't before.  
"Okay, well, maybe I'm wrong then. Go take a shower."  
He frowned a bit but did so. I sat down on the bed and dug through my bag to find my medicines. To my horror, I discovered that both my sleeping pills and antipsychotics were gone. The bottles were empty.  
"Wh… what the fuck?!"  
I downed the rest of the water in my bottle to calm down. I picked up the book I stole from the bookshelf downstairs with shaking hands and tried to involve myself in it. It didn't work. Jerry came out from the bathroom a while later in just his boxers. They were the purple ones with "juicy" written across the ass in big red font.  
When he got over to the bed, the lights clicked off. We both tried to get the lights to come back on, but they wouldn't. Thunder rolled, and lightning flashed. I felt my resolve to weather the night crumble. Tears stung my eyes.  
"Jerry I… I wanna go home. Someone stole my medicine. And there's something just so wrong here."  
He came over and hugged me tightly. I trembled in his arms. It got harder to breathe as he gently wiped the tears from my eyes.  
He tried the door again. Even throwing his weight into it and trying to bust it down yielded no results. He tried the window again. By the time he was done, his shoulder was bruised, and I felt incredibly guilty.  
"I'll find us a way out of here. Don't worry."  
"J— Jerry, don't worry about it. Not now. You've done enough, really. We should at least try and rest a little, and then we can figure out how to get the hell out of here."  
I knew that without my medicine, there was no way I'd be getting rest. But I knew Jerry could. He nodded.  
"Okay, you're right."  
I picked my phone up off the bed and scooted over.  
"Okay, you just… you stay on your side, and I'll stay on mine."  
He slid under the covers and nodded. The rain was a peaceful sound, despite the odd and ominous situation we were in right now.  
I attempted to read the Agatha Christie book I had nabbed by my phone's flashlight. Eventually, my eyes began to hurt. It's not like I could enjoy it anyways with how on edge I was. I sighed, turning off the flashlight and laying the book and my phone on the nightstand. Jerry was laying there on his back on his side of the bed, staring up at the ceiling. He was a lot closer than I thought, but it didn't make me that uncomfortable.  
"This house has weird vibes, dude."  
"You're telling me. I felt something wrong the moment we stepped in here."  
He looked over at me.  
"I'm sorry Jack, I… it was stupid of me to drag you on this trip and think that nothing would happen."  
I got more comfortable, sliding down and laying my head on the pillow.  
"Don't apologize. Your heart was in the right place."  
Jerry turned over on his side to face me.  
_Was he closer?_  
"I just wanted you to have a break from it all. You deserve that after the crap that's happened, but... it seems like I did the opposite, and I'm so sorry."  
Feeling his big blue eyes burning into me made my mouth go dry, and my heart beat funny.  
I rolled over to face him and shook my head. I didn't think about the words that left my mouth. I didn't have to.  
"Jerry, you're the best kind of person."  
He laughed softly.  
"Speak for yourself, Jack."  
My stomach was full of butterflies. I stared at Jerry's face, into his eyes. He has a particularly dark freckle underneath his nose that I'd never noticed before. His lips were full, and his eyes were the prettiest shade of icy blue, with long eyelashes. His lips were curved into the faintest of smiles.  
"I think you're the sweetest person I've ever met, Jack." He whispered.  
I was lost in his eyes. _God, why do things change on me so fast? Why was my chest so tight?_ But… maybe it hadn't changed. Maybe it was there the whole time.  
I felt something rising inside me, clawing desperately to get out. I knew once I said it, there would be no pulling it back. And I didn't care. It was terrifying, but I wanted to say it.  
"Jerry, I l—"  
Before I could finish, a dying scream rang out somewhere in the house. It was followed by doors opening and shocked gasps.


	2. Right Place, Right Time

Jerry put the pedal to the medal. The burning remains of Bedside Manor quickly shrunk in the rearview mirror. I looked and found the small cooler we'd kept in the backseat. Hot water bottles and half-spoiled bananas were the only things it had to offer that looked even remotely edible. They tasted so sweet in our dry mouths it hurt our gums. Despite that, we made short work of it, devouring them like wild dogs as we put as much distance between us and that god-forsaken place as possible.  
We both ended up throwing it all back up out the window since we'd had little to nothing to eat in two weeks, and neither of us wanted to risk stopping.  
We said very little as he drove. Jerry smoked several cigarettes out the window. If we were in some normal circumstances, I would have scolded him. But if I smoked, I could've chain-smoked two whole packs in a row.  
At some point, Jerry had grabbed my hand and was squeezing it tightly. Like he was terrified that I'd disappear. I didn't complain. Truthfully, I was terrified he'd disappear.  
After we got out onto the highway and got just outside of Dallas, we finally decided that it would be safe to stop. We stopped at 7-Eleven, and Jerry was able to find some microwaveable soups. After he filled the tank, we sat in the car, drinking cup after cup of room temperature soup. The flavors were incredible, and it felt like a meal for a king.  
We were both able to keep it down, along with several bottles of water and some saltine crackers. I took over driving, and Jerry passed out in the passenger seat. I felt my strength gradually beginning to return.  
Jerry woke up sometime just before sunrise.  
"Hey."  
"Do you feel better?"  
"Yeah. What about you?"  
"Jerry?"  
"Yeah?"  
"Do you remember Lucy?"  
"That girl we met during the mayfly attack? Yeah, why?"  
The relief that washed over me was so intense I started to cry. I swerved a bit, and we nearly went off the road.  
"Woah woah woah, Jack, what?!"  
I laughed through the tears.  
"Nothing. I'm just so fucking glad this is over."  
I pulled the car into the emergency lane on the highway and completely broke down. Tears ran through my fingers as I pressed my hands onto my dirty face. It didn't take me long to realize Jerry had started crying too. We stayed there for what felt like ages, just sobbing in equal parts mutual trauma and relief. He wrapped his arms around me and let me cry onto his shoulder, and he laid his head against mine.  
After we'd expended all our tears, Jerry got out and went to relieve himself beside the car. I got out two more extra large water bottles, and we drank every drop to replenish what we'd lost crying so long. Jerry took over for me, and I took my cocktail of meds. I drank some more soup and ate more crackers before letting my eyes slip shut.  
I woke up much later than I expected to Jerry shaking me.  
"Dude, are you alive? It's going on seven hours. I've tried to wake you up a couple times."  
_Seven hours?!_  
I guess it made enough sense. That period in alien captivity probably put my body in a state of exhaustion, the likes of which it had never experienced.  
"Yeah yeah, I'm awake, holy fuck."  
I felt rejuvenated. That was the best sleep I'd ever had. I smiled at Jerry.  
"Are you feeling better?"  
"Yeah, I was able to keep down a PB&J that I got when I stopped for gas again. I got you one too."  
I took the little peanut butter and jelly pocket and took small bites of it. I can't describe to you in words how good it tasted. I thankfully didn't have to see it come up after I ate it.  
The sun went down just before we reached the state line. Jerry decided that we would stop for the night. We pulled into a little motel parking lot, and he went inside to get a room.  
He came back a few minutes later with a room key and an exhausted smile on his face.  
"God, it's gonna be so nice to sleep in a bed."  
I nodded in agreement. We trudged to the room marked two. Room one was unavailable due to some ['strange occurrences,'](https://youtu.be/6ylRFnSMIyw) Jerry said, and I was perfectly happy to leave it at that. For a cheap motel room, it was very well-cleaned and nice.  
As soon as the door was shut, Jerry stripped out of his filthy, tattered clothes. I did the same. We were too desperate to be clean to care about each other's nakedness. He let me be the first to shower, and as the hot water ran over me, I watched the grit and grime of the last two weeks swirl down the drain as water darker than Mississippi mud.  
After I was done, I put on my only other pair of clean boxers and laid under the covers while Jerry showered. My mind raced.  
When he came out, I was crying again. Jerry came over to me. He didn't ask questions, instead wrapping me in a hug. I let him hold me for a while before laying down. We started facing away from each other, our backs pressed together. But it didn't take long before we were facing one another.  
"Are you alright, dude?"  
"Not really, but I… I think I will be. I think things may get at least a little better."  
He nodded. Staring into each other's eyes, I felt the flutters in my chest again.  
"Jack… I know it's been a while. But… what were you gonna say? Before… you know, everything happened. It's really driving me crazy."  
_Was it just me? Or were our faces closer?_  
"I… I don't know if I've got the guts to say it again."  
He gave me a knowing smile. His lips, even now, looked soft. And closer to mine.  
"Well, you don't have to say it if you're scared to. I think I know what you meant."  
I knew when he touched our lips together that the feelings I had for him would be genuine for me, and there was nothing I could do about it. There was no old lady murder to interrupt. This kiss was gonna seal my fate. And I didn't care. In fact, I could feel myself leaning forward.  
I could feel Jerry's surprise when I closed the small distance between our faces. His lips were soft and warm, and he tasted like cigarettes. He was gonna have to brush his teeth next time.  
I chuckled softly as our lips moved together softly. Next time. Jerry chuckled too.  
"Dude," he said softly, "you've got some serious bad breath going on right now."  
I pulled away from him, laughing now.  
"Speak for yourself, Jerry! You taste like you licked an ashtray!"  
He playfully punched my shoulder.  
"Maybe we should rinse our mouths out before this goes any further. And I think there's still some of those mints in your bag."  
I nodded, and we went into the bathroom. We stood there, staring at each other in the mirror as we did our best to rinse the gross out of our mouths.  
We popped several mints, and once our breaths were icy and clean, Jerry pulled me back into bed, on top of him. He pressed our foreheads together.  
"I love you, Jack."  
I bit my lip.  
"I love you, Jerry."  
He smiled a serene and relieved smile.  
"You have no idea just how nice that is to hear."  
He pressed our lips together again, and pretty soon, he was kissing me breathless. Something told me this was gonna be a long night.

*******

I woke up the next morning, sore and in desperate need of a shower. I'd exhaustedly popped my meds sometime around 1 AM. I watched the sunrise out of the motel window. It wasn't a sunrise over the Pacific Ocean, but it was just as beautiful to me, with Jerry snuggled into my side. 


End file.
